I made a start to finish video on how to replace the RX7 FD plastic door handles with the aluminum ones that are commonly used. In this specific application, my girlfriend bought the Napol Performance aluminum RX7 FD handles. We got them in the mail within a week of ordering them from Canada off eBay and they were surprisingly good quality. This video serves as a reference for individuals that want to see the process of removing an RX7 FD door handle and disassembling the door latch mechanism.

The other day I hanging out at the Google Fremont campus, enjoying a lively #WordPress presentation by Kimberly Gauthier (KeepTheTailWagging.com) and happened to run across the Mervin Manufacturing Head Quarters! Their glowing florescent green logo caught my eyes! I spent 3 good seasons up at Mt Baker and Glacier WA during our epic La Nina season. Unfortunately, this season I haven’t spent much time up in the cascades due to the slushy rain. 🙁

I wanted to share this photo on here because I absolutely miss shredding Baker pow!

UPDATED: fixed missing/broken gist link with the code snippet.UPDATE #2 May 24, 2017: updating this post since S3 has a new UI.

Recently I decided to ditch registrar DNS Managers like GoDaddy’s in favor of Amazon’s Route53. I really like their console and the DNS is snappy and responsive, not to mention the handy features when creating and pointing to Load Balancers for your TLD. However, one draw back of Route 53 is the lack of subdomain forwarding. Below is a quick solution.

All you will need is an Amazon S3 bucket, the static website end-point, and a Route 53 CNAME.

1.) Create an S3 Bucket: Name the bucket ie: subdomaintoForward.mydomain.com. It has to be the exact subdomain you wish to forward otherwise Route 53 won’t resolve. Choose the region and create!

2.) Set Properties: I don’t typically Set Properties for S3 bucket forwarding, but it’s an option for your specific use case. Skip this step if you’re not familiar with this.

3.) Set Permissions: Be sure to set the group permissions under Everyone to Read. This will allow the public to access the S3 bucket contents.

Open up “Static Website Hosting” than select “Use this bucket to host a website”. Make the “Index document” simply index.html. After that, you will need to copy/paste the sample JSON below into “Redirection Rules”.

IMPORTANT: Open up Notepad or SimpleEdit and make note of the ENDPOINT. This will be used in Step 5 when you point the subdomain DNS.

Be sure to read the JSON closely and edit HostName and ReplaceKeyPrefixWith values. Paste in the XML below:

Again, just for clarification lets breaks down the JSON above. In this example, I want subdomaintoForward.mydomain.com to 301 redirect to http://domaintoforwardto.com/anything/after/thedomain/index5.html – compare this URL to the XML above, you should be able to figure out the syntax.

Click Save!

5.) Create A CNAME in Route 53: Make note of the “Static Website Hosting” End-point, copy that, then open up Amazon Route 53. Select your Hosted Zone and click “Go to Record Sets”. Click “Create Record Set” and configure your Record. In this example, domaintoForward is the subdomain, use CNAME, and paste in the Static Web Hosting End-point into Value. Create the record.

Over the past year or so I’ve become a fan of @Zedomax on Twitter. He caught my attention with his open frame bitcoin miner design. About a year and a half ago I got into mining Litecoin, Dogecoin, and using exchanges to play a bit of the Bitcoin game. I soon discovered how resourceful Zedomax’s channels and websites are, and wondered why I never seen these show up on Google SERPS. Let’s not get into SEO!

Max recommends getting the LCD screen with assembly, which makes replacing the LCD screen less complex and is only about $20 more. All you have to do is swap over the motherboard, camera, and back frame.

This video is a bit inspiring, it’s been a while since I’ve rooted, flashed, and help fix broken Android phones. Perhaps I’ll have to provide my services to local friends when I have downtime. :]

NWToyRun 2014: Thanks to David Kim and Caryl DelaRosa from Nice-Hunters!

I thought I’d write a quick little blurp about the 2014 season at Evergreen Drift! I had a great season in 2014! Although I did run into a few issues during GrassRoots competitions; I had a blast getting back behind the wheel and practicing this season! Prior to this season, I did take a 3 year break from drifting but I’m back and hope to compete more in 2015!

In this Agent Development Series Podcast, Jim Nuth discusses how he’s digitalized his real estate listing systems, from storing local files/folders on his Mac to moving to cloud based solutions such as Evernote or Google Drive. Sticking with Evernote over the years, Nuth realized that there is limitations, which includes how many files each folder/stack could have and if you upgrade to a paid account there’s still a ceiling to hit.

Jim Nuth decided to utilize resources that eXp Realty provides for agents and brokers, in this presentation he shows how his paperless listing systems works using Google Drive. If you’re an agent looking to comparing Evernote to Google Drive, this 45 minute presentation is perfect for you!

Prevents NI4 to NJ4, the AT&T/Samsung OTA update keeps bugging me and I want to turn off the software update. If you are on a rooted AT&T Galaxy S4 and want to prevent the OTA update you can block the following apps with App Quarantine ROOT/FREEZE. Last time my OTA updated it went to NI4, broke Safestrap and Towelroot!

Block these in App Quarantine, tap the Settings icon and tap Filter, turn on Advanced and check Include system services. Block the following apps according to guut13 on XDA Forums.

It seems to be a constant struggle with keeping my Samsung Galaxy S4 rooted with a custom boot loader… every OTA it seems they roll out a patch or overwrite customizations. I think there’s something to do with the boot loader being locked in a way we can’t put custom ROMS like CyanogenMod on? Not entirely sure…

Well, the only real thing I really want my rooted S4 to do is have WiFi and USB tethering… When I’m on the run, I absolutely love having my Nexus 7 or laptop handy in case of a sudden coffee shop has horrible WiFi…

First and foremost you will need to root your AT&T Galaxy S4, below is a link to how to.

Found a plugin that might be useful for people needing to block xml-rpc.php pingbacks. It disables to methods in the xmlrpc api that allow attackers to send pingback data to your WordPress site. I am currently seeing a flood of pingback spam, which is being written into wpdb. I really don’t care for pingbacks especially when this vulnerability is being used as a denial of service.